European Training Foundation: extension to the Mediterranean countries (2nd amend. Regul. 1360/90/EEC)

PURPOSE : extend the scope of activity of the European Training Foundation COMMUNITY MEASURE : Regulation 1572/98/EC amending Regulation 1360/90/EEC establishing a European Training Foundation. CONTENT : The Regulation seeks to extend the mandate of the European Training Foundation to Mediterranean territories and third countries designated in the MEDA Regulation 1488/96/EC. The Regulation also specifies the details of the scope of application of the Foundation : it will operate in the field of initial and continuing vocational training, as well as retraining for young people and adults, including, in particular, management training. In addition, at the request of the Commission or of the eligible countries, the Foundation may provide vocational training programmes agreed on by the Commission and one or several countries as part of the Community policy of assistance to these countries, using multidisciplinary teams of specialists. Experience of Community vocational training programmes will be drawn upon actively. Priority will be given to to projects of an innovative value and - for the candidate countries for accession - to projects which relate directly to the Community's programmes in the field of vocational training. Given the extension of the geographical scope of the Foundation, its governing board an additional representative is added. This does not, however, change the number of votes at the Commission's disposal. Changes are also provided for with the purpose of strengthening the policy of the Foundation and improving its efficiency. These include : - strengthening the links between the Foundation and other Community actions : the Commission has to ensure that there is coherence and complementarity (e.g. with respect to TEMPUS and MED-CAMPUS); - enabling the Commission to support the foundation in its co-operation with other Community bodies, particularly CEDEFOP; - strengthening the decision-making powers of the Foundation's governing board by more closely aligning its work programme and its budget; - the projects and activities in the annual work programme shall be accompanied by an estimate of the necessary expenditure and by allocations of staff and budgetary resources; - the members of the forum shall be selected from experts among training and other circles concerned with the work of the Foundation, taking into account the need to ensure the presence of representatives of the social partners, of the Commission, of those international organisations active in the provision of training assistance, and of the eligible countries and territories; - the director of the Foundation shall be appointed for 5 years, renewable once for a further period of 5 years; - monitoring and evaluation procedure : this will be carried out with the help of external experts. The Commission is to present the first results of this procedure in a report to the European Parliament, the Council and the Economic and Social Committee by 31/12/2000 and thereafter every 3 years. ENTRY INTO FORCE : 31/07/1998.�